Speaking as a white guy in his fifties, I’m with you all the way. I find the racist imagery in these cartoons cringeworthy. Not only is it offensive, it’s not very funny, and it’s not very funny in large part because it’s lazy. What shall we do NOW to make the audience laugh?..I know, we’ll dress Bugs up in blackface! We’ll have a character speak in fake Chinese! We’ll parade offensive stereotypes around for all to see, keeping the audience in stitches, until we get a, you know, an actual funny idea.
“An accepted wit has but to say ‘Pass the mustard,’ and they roar their ribs out!” Sorry. It should be harder than that.
One the one hand I see some real harm in attempts to sterilizing historic works clean of all possible offense. Some made nice nursery rhymes for example are just plain dumb. From pretty early on kids can handle an explanation about what was and how that is different than what is and the crows in Dumbo will completely, heh, fly over their heads as a racist stereotype.
OTOH I see that casual perpetuation of stereotypes should not be excused cavalierly.
I read Huck Finn aloud to my kids in order to explain that I was saying that word in the context of the book and how it was used in the context of the time being written about. Shylock does not need to be edited out of The Merchant of Venice; the nature of the stereotype does however need to be discussed.
Not sure where the line should be drawn. (The quoted scene from Tom and Jerry is clearly way past it though.)
Well, I think you’ve summed it up pretty well. We don’t do kids any favors by whitewashing (heh) the past. Many people DID hold ideas and stereotypes that we generally consider highly offensive today. And these ideas naturally showed up in books, movies, plays, fine art, you name it.
Pick up the Bobbsey Twins, the early Hardy Boys books, just about any book written prior to about 1930 and many written afterward, and you’ll find all the casual racism you’ll ever need. At some point kids are going to find this stuff–we can’t censor all of it, even if it were a good idea–and making sure they see it through a critical lens is important.
So, what to read despite the problems? I think that literary merit matters. A relative of mine decided to read an early Bobbsey Twins book to his five-year-old daughter. The book was chock-full of racist stereotyping (good ol’ dim-witted Dinah and Sam!), and to his credit he tried to explain every negative stereotype, but there were like six per page and it was, shall we say, slow going, and though his daughter was and is very bright, she was not capable of understanding all the ramifications. That book was rewritten in the sixties, eliminating the most obviously appalling parts, and I have no trouble saying it was no great loss. Huck Finn and Merchant of Venice are …different.
I also think that the extent to which the stereotypes are central to an understanding of the text matter. Huck Finn minus the racism, if you could even do that, loses much of its punch. Compare that to Mary Poppins, the novel (well, okay, there’s no comparison, but bear with me), which originally had a chapter in which the children find a compass that magically whisks them off to North, South, East, and West. Each of these places is populated by stereotypical natives (“Red Indians,” African black mammies, etc.)–it’s an extremely impressive collection of racial stereotypes in just a few short pages.
PL Travers was eventually told the chapter had become offensive and needed to be rewritten. She resisted, partly because she never agreed with anybody else’s ideas and partly because she really did not see anything wrong with it (she was convinced that black children loved it), but when her publisher threatened to take the book out of print she agreed. The rewritten version has polar bears and other animals, and it loses absolutely nothing compared to the original.
And if you think that Mary Poppins is a great classic of children’s literature, which I don’t think it is but that’s certainly a defensible position, then rewriting that chapter should make for a big improvement and bring it into a century that cares about the feelings of children who aren’t white–because the details of the original chapter aren’t central to the book.
Well, the writer has obviously never owned a Siamese cat. Perfectly realistic. I only had one of those demons; owning two is unwise. But I miss my Mother Sasha every day.
You’ve heard of the Black Irish? She’s one of the Red Irish, though nobody in her family ever owned the Washington Redskins.
I personally find the racism in old works to be funny…in a “Hooooollllly crap” sort of way. And that’s speaking as an Indian (we do call each other that) who has facepalmed many times at Judy Garland singing “I’m an Indian too” or Peter Pan productions.
You laugh and you move on. The real insult is when people try and tell you that you have no right to be offended (see mascot controversies)
For fuck’s sake, I know that. The tribe is called the motherfucking Pickaninnies, which I’m pretty sure is not a tribe recognized by the BIA. Yes, it’s a fantasy. It’s a RACIST fantasy. How on earth do you think that pointing out it’s a fantasy makes it somehow not insanely racist?
Did you find it racist in the original comic strip when she was adopted by someone of the same race? Or is this a sudden concern of yours unique to this version of the story?
Yeah, I was reading Three Men in a Boat a year or so ago and enjoying spending time with these goofy friends, and then the author used the word “nigger” of someone the main character encountered. I didn’t think “Gosh, people used to be so racist and no one would say this now, how quaint!” I thought “Damn, that’s an ugly reminder of racism in what was supposed to be, for me, an innocent, amusing read.”
I never did finish the book. I was thrown out of it by that reference and never really found the desire to go back in, even though I can acknowledge that the author was not necessarily more, or much more, racist than the average person of his day.
I’m with Left Hand. Viewing American Indians as semimythical noble savages isn’t better–it’s worse. They were–and are–people, not a novelty. Not to condemn Barrie for that, as he was just a product of his time, but it’s definitely good to be aware of it. Like Left Hand, I’m not saying to toss out Peter Pan, but at least to know that it’s a pretty loaded work.
When you see things like that, it’s pretty clear that authors and filmmakers seemed to be assuming their audiences were all little white boys and girls, that it basically didn’t occur to them that kids of color were going to be watching these works at all. Not only that but the racism is so blatant. In the Disney Peter Pan, it’s not enough just to have horribly stereotyped indigenous people–they have to include an entire song that’s essentially “Look at the funny red-skinned people.” People were proud enough of this attitude that they stuck it in a kid’s movie.
Again, all indicative of the time, but I think worth noting that we’re past the point of assuming that our primary audience is little white kids. And that all kids need to see that people of color aren’t cute props or novelties.
It’s puzzling why the change in the race of the daughter mandates the accommodating change in the race of the adopting father. It suggests that a cross-racial adoption was taboo.
(Which, of course, in times past has very much been the case.)
Well I only opened this thread to see what’s up with Lady and the Tramp, but I have to agree about the Peter Pan Indians. We rented that movie some years ago when our kids were young and, you know, how can you go wrong with a Disney kids’ cartoon? And when the Indian stuff came on we were pretty much horrified. That was some bad stuff there and frankly not all that entertaining. Not terribly germane to the plot. We didn’t even remember that part from when we saw it as kids (mainly because it wasn’t very entertaining and not so much the racism, I think–but I don’t know. Possibly because as kids we knew Indians and they were nothing like that so it just didn’t track.)
A black guy adopting a cute little white girl (or Asian girl), when there are disproportionately more black girls in need of adoption, would make a lot of people’s heads explode. Including mine.
A white man adopting a black girl wouldn’t infuriate me as much, but it would be a tiring trope. I don’t think we need to any more movies where the white hero saves the day for the ever-grateful negro. Especially since the film is the production of two black megastars (Jay-Z and Will Smith). Why shouldn’t Daddy Warbucks be a black guy?
I’m fine with mixing things up. Nell Carter played an awesome Miss Hannigan, for instance. But race does matter sometimes.
And to add, a white actor isn’t any more entitled to play Warbucks than a black actor is. They wanted Jaime Fox to play that part, and so they cast him. No explanation beyond that is needed.
Actually the Great God Pan. Almost the entire opposite of Christ Him Crucified. Please carry on.
Jerome was a damn sight less racist than Americans of his era, and many of this era. His autobiography has an amusing bit on his lecture circuit… Once only — at Chattanooga — did I meet with disagreement : and then I was asking for it. Two negroes had been lynched a few days before my arrival on the usual charge of having assaulted a white woman: proved afterwards ( as is generally the case ) to have been a trumped-up lie. All through the South, this lynching horror had been following me; and after my reading I asked for permission to speak on a matter about which my conscience was troubling me. I didn’t wait to get it, but went straight on. At home, on political platforms, I have often experienced the sensation of stirring up opposition. But this was something different. I do not suggest it was anything more than fancy, but it seemed to me that I could actually visualize the anger of my audience. It looked like a dull, copper-coloured cloud, hovering just above their heads, and growing in size. I sat down amid silence. It was quite a time before anybody moved. And then they all got up at the same moment, and turned towards the door. On my way out, in the lobby, a few people came up to me and thanked me, in a hurried furtive manner.
Actually, I see there’s more, but I get tired of the editing limits here. The treatment of the negro in America calls to Heaven for redress. I have sat with men who, amid vile jokes and laughter, told of “Buck Niggers” being slowly roasted alive; told how they screamed and writhed and prayed; how their eyes rolled inward as the flames crept up till nothing could be seen but two white balls. They burn mere boys alive and sometimes women. These things are organized by the town’s “leading citizens” Well-dressed women crowd to the show, children are lifted up upon their fathers’ shoulders. The Law, represented by grinning policemen, stands idly by. Preachers from their pulpits glorify these things, and tell their congregations that God approves. The Southern Press roars its encouragement. Hangings, shootings would be terrible enough. These burnings; these slow grillings of living men, chained down to iron bedsteads; these tearings of live, quivering flesh with red-hot pinchers can be done only to glut some hideous lust of cruelty. The excuse generally given is an insult to human intelligence. Even if true, it would be no excuse. In the majority of cases, it is not even pretended. The history of the Spanish Inquisition unrolls no greater shame upon the human race. The auto da fe, at least, was not planned for the purpose of amusing a mob. In the face of this gigantic horror, the lesser sufferings of the negro race in America may look insignificant. But there must be tens of thousands of educated, cultured men and women cursed with the touch of the tar-brush to whom life must be one long tragedy. Shunned, hated, despised, they have not the rights of a dog. From no white man dare they even defend the honour of their women. I have seen them waiting at the ticket offices, the gibe and butt of the crowd, not venturing to approach till the last white man was served. I have known a woman in the pains of childbirth made to travel in the cattle wagon. For no injury at the hands of any white man is there any redress. American justice is not colour blind. Will the wrong never end ?
I agree on the literary merit claim, a lot of these works people are talking about are dime novel style mass-produced children’s books of low quality. I will say that I have never once understood objections to Huck Finn. Twain was very explicitly trying to portray Southern racism accurately, and he did so quite literally to show that it’s bad. It’s intended as scathing satire on Southern racism, and Twain himself was probably among the most racially progressive men of his generation. ’
In fact arguably Twain’s views would make him fairly acceptable even today, he wasn’t just an abolitionist, but a strong believer in blacks (and Asians) receiving equal treatment to whites in the legal system, educational system etc. He was also a big supporter of women’s suffrage and women’s equality.
It’s like people just ignore all that because he uses the N word in Huck Finn, when he’s actually showing a picture of reality there, and doing so to paint racism negatively. He shows that Huck actually learns Jim is a human being and every bit his equal, but at the same time shows the larger society they’re in to be an extremely bad one. To me his use of the N word in that book is no different than use of the same in 12 Years a Slave.
Twain does show some of the biases of his time in his portrayal of Jim, but I don’t think many other white authors writing about the 1830s and publishing in the 1880s had black heroic characters in their novels at all.
Lots of planets have a South.